That is indeed what the stories this morning were saying, although to be fair, Tony Clement (the Minister responsible) suggests otherwise here. As for me, I'm far more worried that the response rate will fall precipitously as people look at the thing and decide that, if its not required, they're not going to bother (and that those who do bother will make for a biased sample).

Everyone hates filling out the long form, and the only reason you do it is because its illegal not to. So expect to see the response rate to StatsCan's new voluntary survey fall towards nil, which in effect means that the nation has taken a scalpel to its own brain and removed that part devoted to memory.

A truly stupid decision, probably the dumbest since Brian Mulroney decided to try turn Stats Canada's publications into revenue generators back in the 1980s. If you wondering why so much U.S. data is floating free about the Internet to be played with in interesting ways, whereas in Canada you have to pay $1 for every digit, blame him.

Well, I have a theory about that. What the "anarchists" are trying to accomplish is illustrated here:

They are in the noise making business, in other words. Now, you may hear it argued that what they are drowning out is the voices of the legitimate protesters and that's true, but not really relevant. Their intent, what they are trying to do, is squelch the official message of the G8/G20 leaders, so that all the summit appears to amount to is their own violence and the police crackdown that inevitably follows.

And in T.O. they did a pretty good job, aided by the fact that this particular meeting was so content-free as to be positively Seinfeldian. What was in that final statement? Something vague about deficits? Something about banks? Ah but here's a picture of a burning police car, and here's a clip of cops charging a line of peaceful demonstrators. Checkmate, mateys! G8/20 leaders (esp. Mr. Harper) are made to appear impotent; the police look like thugs.

As to police behavior over the weekend, well, I would feel better about it if something useful had actually been accomplished, but we seem be to witnessing just another episode of the same show that gets put on whenever these summits are held. Given that the anarchists communicate with each other the same way everyone else does these days--facebook, twitter feeds, text messages--all of which are easily monitored, I don't see why something can't be done between summits to put a dent in these guys' activities.

...something to break a cycle that is now well into its second decade and is, frankly, getting old.

But they should make their own way like an honest enterprise...like these guys, for example. They should not be awarded "must carry" status (and, frankly, they should be ashamed for even asking for it, rabid free-marketers that they must assuredly be).

And, by the way Al Jazeera English went through an extensive series of negotiations with both the CJC and B'nai Brith to ensure that its Canadian offerings didn't include the kind of anti-Semitic ranting that occasionally appears on the Arab language station. Since, left unchecked, SunTV is likely to offend any ethnic/religious minority that isn't Israeli, will they accept the same kind of scrutiny/oversight?

...because details aren't up yet on the Wildrose Alliance website: could the section be left in the code but amended around until it was made irrelevant? Dunno. But its interesting that even the Alberta Right has figured out that to adopt the pure Speechy philosophy is to risk being dubbed kooks and racists.

Saturday, June 26, 2010

I'm safe in Ottawa, by the way. Wonderful city; I've dropped about $100 at bookstores I never know existed (Argosy, All About Books), and found that bar that served the wonderful raspberry beer (The Clock Tower).

You would think that, given the disaster in The Gulf, it would be clear sailing for the Keystone XL pipeline, that would import up to 900,000 barrels per day of tar sands oil from Alberta, Canada to the U.S. Gulf Coast. You would, however, be wrong, as this letter from 50 congressional representatives makes clear:

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Normally, on a warm summer weekend, I would spend my time cruising downtown TO's used bookstore-strips, now in tragic decline due to the Internet and a general increase in stupidity, and then reading my new-bought treasures at some local sports-bar, dressed pretty much like this guy here (except that I would be wearing one of my many, many pairs of sports sandals, because way back when when everyone wore sandals and stuck flowers in their hair was a Golden Age and you youth of today, with your green hair and nose rings and your tattoos and that shitty music.... all suck magnificently).

But not this weekend, with the G8/G20 lock-down in force. The wife and I are off to Ottawa because she's allergic to the smell of tear-gas and they've got book-stores in Ottawa and its a nice cultural center that's less than a plane-ride away. (Wish they had better restaurants, though)

Anyone around over the weekend that wants to quaff a few beers, email me at bigcitylib@hotmail.com and we'll see what might transpire. I think I've rigged up something Sunday afternoon with Balbulican, Marie Eve, and Dr. Dawg himself, who will, for a small fee, actually let you touch that crazy mustache. I won't reveal the location until later, and privately, to avoid assassins and unwanted press attention, but it will be somewhere near the market.

That is: some in Alberta, like Ezra Levant, see the Northern Gateway Project as a means of getting tar-sands oil to other markets should the Obama administration impose clean-up measures, like a carbon tax, upon it. Make us live up, and we will send our oil overland to Kitimat and sell it to the Chinese Communists, is the message.

Except that Iggy's move would effectively kill the Gateway Project; so in effect the LPoC position is that the oil-sands must be developed but must not be allowed to escape (literally) their environmental responsibilities.

And while the measure may not play that well in Alberta, its B.C land through which the pipe-line must run, and B.C. waters that a spill would pollute. So it isn't really up to them, is it?

And, as Imp notes this is the kind of security a $1,000,000,000 buys you:

1. The G8 security team moves fast! Exposed as a major security breach, a "doozy" was one word used, in reference to the Deerhurst Inn's floor plans being available online. They're still up after being on the national news last night (fast forward to 7:00 min mark). Good work security team!I see synergy!

PS. Presumably the lake the lakeside rooms are beside is a real, and not a fake, lake.

Well, since the article in question is from 2006, it isn't surprising that Mr. Flannery should have forgotten his own words. In any case, here's the quote in context; its quite consistent with Flannery's current position:

This is old news (May 25th), but its about the latest I've heard re the alleged assault upon Carleton University students Mark Klibanov, a native of Israel, and Nick Bergamini, a self professed Zionist:

So everyone, it appears, has gone home for summer break, and the investigation waits for their return when, presumably, our two victims get another chance at identifying the assailant that they claim to have seen around the Carlton campus. Klibanov's account here more or less jibes with the original one on Bergamini's facebook page. Neither mentions the third person that accompanied Klibanov and Bergamini that night, who has been made note of in the police accounts and alluded to by Klibanov here.

And here he is singing the praises of an "activism course", entitled Science and Society, that he took at the University of Ottawa, and which has been mentioned in several MSM articles on the topic.

And here's a long .pdf relating to said activism course--a defense of it and Denis Rancourt, its teacher--which ran into trouble over various issues (see below), and which the university at one point looked set to discontinue (and may indeed have discontinued). Note several emails from Haridge, and also a letter of support from Sabrina Bowman, Office of Pat Martin, M.P. (Winnipeg Centre) on page 28. A short excerpt:

If you, as university administrators, are interested in helping shape students into critical and independent thinkers, leaders in their local and global communities that push creative andinnovative solutions to global problems, you will not only allow this course to continue, you will give it the resources it requires and work with Professor Rancourt rather than against him. However, if you would like to mould students into a single prototype that does not ask too many questions or "cause too much trouble," by all means, continue fighting against the course.

Note also on page 32 and forward, the accusations of anti-semitism against the professor running the course, Denis Rancourt, which resulted in the professor's filing a notice of grievance, and which may have been behind the move to discontinue.

The course is being taught as "a course where you bring in a person to basically bash George Bush [and] the Jews in Isra‘l; it's not what the course was meant to be,"[ said Alain St-Amant, head of the chemistry department]. According to St-Amant, the course has included "anti-Semitic crap."

Of course, innocent until proven guilty, and all that. But definitely more unneeded trouble for University of Ottawa.

PS. haven't really had time to grind through the .pdf. If anyone finds anything interesting in it that I've missed, please note in the comments.

Update:Here's another of the suspects, Matthew Morgan-Brown, defending the "activism" course. Thanks Otis in comments.

Friday, June 18, 2010

Meet spaceship IKAROS , its sail deployed, and off to the other side of the Sun by way of Venus. Its 20 meters across diagonally. This is the first picture of the first working solar-sail driven spacecraft ever taken.

...is far more popular than Sun TV. Facebook doesn't lie. On the other hand, we now have an idea of Sun's potential audience, although I think 793 viewers will prove to be on the high-side. Some of them will undoubtedly drop their channel changer under the couch and pass out face-down trying to find it.

And since the original story quoted "unnamed sources" (government sources??), and served as the backdrop for some high silliness on the part of Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, I am inclined to believe Mr. Morton.

...because I think just the opposite: the ideological space SunTV to work in is quite limited. If they just going to be Conservative, then that's CTV. The only way to distinguish themselves is to embrace teh crazy (hire Ezra). But to do that risks alienating everyone else.

Sun TV therefore has the same problem as the CPoC; they are hamstrung between pleasing the true believers and pissing off the remainder of the country; that's why the government's poll numbers have kept within such a narrow range the past couple of years. That's why Sun TV's audience will be inherently limited.

As you may know, Sun columnist Greg Weston has written several excellent pieces re government over-spending on the upcoming G-8/G-20. As you may also know, Kory Teneycke, the former Stephen Harper spokesperson and man behind Fox News North, is now Greg's boss over at Quebecor. Yesterday, a rumour circulated to the effect that Greg was in the dog-house with his new chief over the excessive truth content in his recent columns:

A check by TSF revealed Greg's recent summit cost columns are archived under his name at torontosun.com, but there are no Weston column links on Sun Media's Eye on the Hill site.Meanwhile, as we wait for Kory et al to launch their media Titanic, here's Bill Brioux dumping on the venture in a most entertaining manner:

Monday, June 14, 2010

You may have read, and possibly been appalled, by this poll from NANOS. This one, on the other hand, which also came out today, hasn't received nearly as much media attention (who the heck is Forum Research?), but it seems less obviously an indication of the coming of the end-times:

The problem with Ford is less the ideological bluster than personality. Not even the right wing of council particularly likes him, and City staff think he's an ogre. If he gets in look forward to another garbage strike, gridlock on council, and much bellowing about how "The Left" won't let him get stuff done.

According to a StatsCanada report released this morning, hate crimes in 2008 were up 35% from the previous year, to 1,036 incidents.

As far as victims go, there is nothing particularly surprising that I can see: once again, Jews are the religious group, blacks the ethnicity, most often targeted.

Hate crimes pertaining to sexual orientation rose a whopping 124% to 159 incidents, though that's still a small portion of the overall total.

On 42% of occasions, the crimes committed were threats and assaults, with vandalism and such like offenses constituting another 49% of occasions.

From a geographical perspective, the report contains a few interesting numbers:When it comes to crimes per 100,000 population, Vancouver tops the chart at 6.3%, that rate almost doubling from last year. But you don't read much about racial tensions in that city. And Calgary, where the Aryan Guard has had two years of fairly heavy press coverage, nevertheless ranks in the middle of the pack.

Dan Leger thinks the CRTC, under pressure from Stephen Harper's Conservative government, will "find a way" to put make Fox News North part of the basic cable package, thus giving the new tv station a guaranteed revenue stream out of the pockets of unwitting and unwilling Canadian cable subscribers. My opinion: if FNN is willing to fight for its audience--like Al Jazeera, for example--then let 'em come. But I would strongly oppose handouts for what appears to be a line-up of has-beens from the Reform Party era. And since this application will come under enormous public scrutiny, I suspect Stephen Harper will keep a mile away from the process, and will accept whatever decision the CRTC makes with uncharacteristic grace.

Yesterday, I caught a glimpse of Toronto's annual naked bike ride, at Yonge and Wellesley. It was awful. I ran screaming into the subway station, and I shall say no more about it than that. Today I am off to see Sex in The City II. I made the wife go see Iron Man II last week (not bad--a bit silly--Mickey Rourke is awesome), and this is payback.

Does anyone know of a brand of probiotic yogurt that contains a testosterone supplement? By Monday I'm going to need a top-up.

Incidentally, or not, Dave Rutherford was one of the few Canuck journalists taken in by the Yes Men's wonderful Copenhagen hoax last December, inadvertently providing air time to one of the hoaxers. But I guess at Fox North Ezra Levant will be on hand for fact-checking purposes.

Wells is heralding the arrival of the apocalypse--he's even shown up here to tsk tsk me in the comments for belittling it--and there are a few others who also seem to think that a right-wing, 24 hour news station in Canada constitutes an existential threat to the nation. On my part, I think that if anyone wants to flush a few hundred million down the tubes chasing a pale Fox knockoff, then at least that money isn't being spent on something that might really damage the fabric of the country.

The biggest problem for a "Fox North", other than the fact that they probably won't get their “mandatory distribution" license--lies simply in the demographics of the nation they wish to entertain. Look at it this way: the Conservative Party of Canada trundles along with the support of a little less than 1/3 of the nation by trying to convince people they are not Conservative. Strip that number down to the hard-core believers, and you have about 10% of the population (look at the Reform party support figures from over the years here). That's the potential size of an audience for a "robustly right" 24 hour news station. And, put bluntly, its about the same size you might need to run a specialty channel--a gay porn station, for example.

Now, most of the gay porn stations I've ever watched actually have a news-cast, which is typically done naked (they also have a cooking show). And unless David Akin is going to shed a few pounds, I can assure you the gay porn station's news-cast will be far, far better than anything on Fox North.

Which segues nicely into the whole notion of "pale" imitations. Considering who Fox-North "stars" might be, you realize how terribly short the Canadian right is on the charisma front. Wells has already ruled himself out, and FN will be hard pressed to find another bald guy of his stature. Monte Solberg is entertaining in 12 second sound bites, but terribly whiny over the long haul. Gerry Nicholls is suitably bald, but again--can he be entertaining enough for long enough to make it work? Adler? Have you seen Adler? A marshmallow in a suit! Ezra Levant? SERIOUSLY?? They'll be drowning in law-suits before the first broadcast! Plus, Ezra is less a pundit than the leader of a small death cult. Normal people--normal Conservative people--hate his guts! I once had a Tory loyalist inform me that if Ezra came out for Liberty, he would have to stand against it.

And that's my 2nd final point. Given the paucity of Canadian Conservative star-power, and the fact that you can still watch the real Fox News in Canada, why would anyone choose the fake version?

Believe me: this sucker is going to be the National Post of the air-waves. It will never make a single penny.

Apparently, there's a seat in the HOC even further away from the floor than Helena Guergis': tomorrow, Rodney Weston will be sitting in that seat.

Also, the debate over possible merger only looks like a gong show. In reality its a secret Liberal plot to address the issue so thoroughly that, when it comes time to vote, the public is comfortable with...nay, bored by...the whole idea, thus pulling the sting in advance from any CPoC attack ads. I'll swear an affidavit to that effect if I can use a fake name.

And it doesn't seem to be harming Iggy and Co. in the polls. If anything, it may be helping. If we can get some eye-gouging and hair pulling going, a majority will surely be ours.

Gawker's investigation of the Sarah Palin breast implant story (did she have 'em installed? Is she still au naturel?) manages to be both professional and host several photos of Sarah looking flamingly, gawdawfully hot in a series of tight tops.

Wednesday, June 09, 2010

Contra the Hill Times, there is nothing I can see at Whois that suggests the Liberal party of Canada has registered http://www.liberaldemocrats.ca/. I've reproduced its Whois record below. Also Contra The Hill Times, Liberaldemocrats.ca does not redirect you to the official LPoC site, in any sense of the term "redirect" that I am familiar with.Try the links yourself and tell me if I'm wrong. But for the time-being this seems to a case of fraudulinking to promote a bullshit rumour.

Actually, Living Wall is a T.O.based company. That's a picture of one of their product at the top of the post (there' a wood frame under the foliage). And while the "pricing" section of their website says "coming soon...", we can find preliminary cost info in one of the company brochures:

Don't know how long this fence is supposed to be, and I'm a bit unsure as whether Living Wall is is actually building the living wall (the project was put out to tender), but we can safely put its cost well into the $10,000s, I think.

As whomped up by some guy on the Blogging Tories forum and not checked by me. But in line with other estimates I've re the performance of a merged NDP/Liberal political entity. I've bolded the caveats.

My own opinion, similar to Dan's, is here. And another reason it ain't gonna happen (I mean a merger of Canadian progressive parties)--at least not before the next election--is: you can't go dancing without a partner, and I have not heard a single NDP blogger/politician in favour of a merger. And why should they be? How could the NDP faction within a Liberal-New Democrat coalition be anything but the juniorist of Jr. partners. Look what's happened to the old Progressive Conservatives within the new CPoC. Poof! Gone without a trace...except for a few brave souls up in the Senate!

So let's put aside the unseemly panic, shall we?

Update: X Sask. NDP Preem Roy Romanow is down with a coalition. Missed that previously. And a fairly authoritative figure too, in my book.

Tuesday, June 01, 2010

The first part of that statement I have no problem with--indeed I wonder if the gov. will actually put its money where its mouth is and charge whatever suspects are rounded-up under our terrorism laws.